Meet the team seeking to pull off the world's first ever head transplant

Valery Spiridonov is battling a condition called Werdnig-Hoffman disease.

Transplant of organs has been a blessing for patients suffering from life threatening diseases or ailments with serious implications, and while heart, kidney and live transplants have helped a lot of people, a duo is now seeking to achieve a medical marvel by performing the first ever head transplant.

55-year-old Chinese surgeon Xiaoping Ren was part of a team that performed the first ever successful hand transplant in the US, and practiced by switching pigs’ forelegs.

The man with a vision has teamed up with an Italian neurosurgeon Sergio Canavero who likens his abilities to that of Dr Frankenstein’s and talks of Nazi doctor Josef Mengele. Having written numerous respected papers including one about seducing women, he announced his enthusiasm for a head transplant back in 2013.

While many scientists and ethicists have ruled out the surgery as junk science that raises false hopes, a 31-year-old Russian tech geek seems to be optimistic about a surgery which is said to have a 90 plus chance of success, as per Ren and Canavero.

Valery Spiridonov is battling a condition called Werdnig-Hoffman disease, a genetic disorder that wastes muscles and motor neurons. This means he can do little more than steer his wheelchair with a joystick, type and feed himself.

His disease not only poses challenges, but is also a fatal one and doctors expected him to be dead now. But Spiridonov seems to have fought back and how.

Not only has he survived longer than doctors expected him to, but he refuses to live on like this and has volunteered for the head transplant Ren and Canavero are going ahead with in 2017.

The doctors said that the process would require around 80 surgeons and tens of millions of dollars in funds. The severed muscles of Spiridonov will be colour coded with that of a brain dead body donor, and a transparent diamond blade will be used in the process.

While the operation will most likely be performed in China since it might not get approval in US, many are saying that Ren and Canavero should be tried for murder if the surgery goes wrong.

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